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Pro Basketball Talk was in Miami for the release of the Nike LeBron 8 PS, the playoff series edition of LeBron James‘ signature shoe. In Part Two of our three-part profile, we take a look at the design of the PS, and how it’s built for the shorter playoff season. As we touched on in…

UPDATE 3:48 pm: After practice on Thursday, Roy apologized for his complaints about playing time, according to the Associated Press. He said it came from a place of frustration. Which is a place it is understandable Roy inhabits. If he weren’t frustrated, he’d be a cyborg. But that still does not change what Nate McMillan…

UPDATE 3:42 pm: From the Department of Redundancy Department, we have an update on our update: Shaq traveled with the team to New York, according to A. Sherrod Blakely of CSN New England. Based on what Doc Rivers said before, that makes Shaq questionable for Game 4 on Easter Sunday. Which is a lot better…

We told you this was coming, but it is now official, Minnesota’s Kevin Love is the NBA’s Most Improved Player. We also told you we were down with that — Love improved his shooting percentage from all over the court, his rebounding percentage and the consistency of his effort. Coach Kurt Rambis (who was not…

I’ll be up front: I don’t like to criticize other media members for their opinions. Sports should be a fun debate and if we disagree about things, so what. The vast majority of people I’ve met in this business are good people, serious and passionate, who realize we have some cool jobs. And I like…

Ted Leonsis wants his teams in the nation’s capital adorned in national colors — he did it to the NHL’s Capitals, and we knew it was going to happen with the Wizards. Thursday they made it official, according to CSN Washington. “The updating of the Wizards brand has been a priority we have focused on…

Indiana has played Chicago tough. They’ve been in it. Now they head home for Game 3 Thursday night. The question was would they be in it without Darren Collison, who sprained an ankle when he stepped back into the foot of a cameraman on the baseline last game. Turns out they may not have to,…

Hey, Memphis. How does it feel to be part of a real, honest-to-goodness playoff series? Fun, isn’t it? The San Antonio Spurs absolutely owned the local television market ratings game this season. But sure Sacramento, move to Los Angeles because the television deal is key. If Bryan Colangelo is out in Toronto, look for 74-year-old…

It’s still a long shot the Kings stay in Sacramento — in the end you are asking a bunch of entrepreneurial, rich capitalists to vote against one of their own moving his business to a place he can (theoretically) make more money. It’s hard to get them to vote no. But they may be getting…

Kobe Bryant and Pau Gasol combined to score 19 points on 5-of-20 shooting, but the Lakers still won Game 2 Wednesday night to even their series. Look at that picture to the right — Kobe and Gasol couldn’t even high-five well. It shows why the Lakers are two-time defending champs. You think Miami wins if…

The problem wasn’t Rick Adelman’s body of work, it was the feeling by Houston Rockets management he wasn’t the guy for a rebuilding team. They want a young coach to grow with and mold a rebuilding team, and so they are reaching out to top assistants from around the league, according to the Houston Chronicle.…

Russell Westbrook slowed down some in Game 2 against Denver, he only had 21 points. Still he was a pretty big part of the Thunder going up 2-0 in their first-round series and the Nuggets still do not have a real good option for slowing him down. Especially when he can pretty much spin and…

It wasn’t pretty, but the Los Angeles Lakers were able to even up their series against the New Orleans Hornets with relative ease. The Hornets were able to shock the Lakers in Game 1 because Los Angeles failed in two fundamental areas: they didn’t establish their big men on offense, and they didn’t contain Chris…

Game 1 of the series between the Denver Nuggets and Oklahoma City Thunder stood out as a highly entertaining contest in an opening weekend full of highly entertaining contests, but the reprise in Game 2 couldn’t quite measure up as a competitive spectacle. Blame the Thunder; OKC used a dominant first quarter as a catalyst…

It’s not a surprise, and it’s about to become official on Thursday. According to the Associated Press, on Thursday Minnesota’s Kevin Love will be named the NBA’s Most Improved Player. Love averaged an impressive 20.2 points and 15.2 rebounds per game this season. He went from being a sixth man for large stretches of last…

These are not your father’s San Antonio Spurs. Well, bad example, because your father’s Spurs had Artis Gilmore and George Gervin, and these definitely are not those Spurs. But these are not the four-time champion Spurs, either. This is a very different team with a different, more offense-minded identity. As Timothy Varner said at 48…

“I told the guys to [appreciate Lamar Odom being given the Sixth Man of the Year award], because this might be his last game in front of the home fans this year.” – A smiling Phil Jackson, who never lets a disappointing loss and 1-0 deficit dampen his wry sense of humor. Apart from that,…

Manu Ginobili is back. With a rather cumbersome looking brace on his sprained right elbow, but he is back. And that could make Game 2 between the Grizzlies and Spurs a lot different than Game 1. In the first game, the Grizzlies focused their defensive efforts on Tony Parker (4-of-12 shooting), tried hard to stop…

The Denver Nuggets are a really good team. In the classic sense of team. They play good team defense. They move the ball on offense. They are well coached. They play hard. They play smart. And all that does not stop a Kevin Durant or a Russell Westbrook. Three times in the last month the…

Before each playoff game, four referees enter their locker room. Only three emerge. The fourth is in attendance in case of injury, a smart move by the league with so much at stake. The greater issue, especially in light of some egregious officiating errors this postseason, is why not utilize that fourth pair of eyes?…